I think the discussion on balancing "dialogue" time with "job
description" time (raised by Stephanie Ranta and Edie Haps) deals with
a very important and practical issue for anyone advocating LO
principles. Of course, this same learning vs. working trade-off is
exercised by everyone who takes the time to read LO Digest. I assume
they all have a job to do.
Learning needs to be structured. So in my experience, in industry,
part of the answer to the time problem is to organise people formally
to take time away from the job and engage in a planned process of
continuous improvement. Although this time should represent about 5%
of their working hours, the most I could ever get was 2 1/2%. This
translates into 1 hour a week, and more typically a 2 hour meeting
every 2 weeks. These meetings need to be scheduled on a regular basis
as much as a year ahead. I am sure the same principle could be applied
in an educational setting. How often do students take a step back from
what they are learning to examine the learning process itself?
There can be no serious learning without competent leadership, a good
learning process and practical techniques to capture the learning that
emerges. But it's not a lot of use lining up all these good things
unless you first have an agreement with management on the issue of
"time away from the job". Many managers I have worked with argue in
simplistic mathematical terms. "If you want 2 1/2% of everybody's
time for LO activities then I will have to hire 2 1/2% more people or
add 2 1/2% overtime." Their thinking appears to be shaped by a mental
model in which employees are like pieces of machinery that must be
kept productively occupied.
Talking to the workforce is of course a different matter entirely.
They know perfectly well how to liberate 2 1/2% of their time and
still perform all of their "job description" duties.
Alan Anderson
alan.anderson@solutia.com
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